Boris Lurie: Nothing To Do But To Try

Boris Lurie: Nothing To Do But To Try is the Museum’s newly released catalog to go along with the exhibition of the same name. With essays, analysis, and history by exhibition curator Sara Softness, artist Molly Crabapple, and historian Eli Tzur, this special book covers Lurie’s life, his art and legacy, and the greater historical contexts.

Boris Lurie: Nothing To Do But To Try is a first-of-its-kind exhibition on the 20th-century artist and Holocaust survivor Boris Lurie. Centered around his earliest work, the so-called War Series, as well as never-before-exhibited objects and ephemera from Lurie’s personal archive, this Museum exhibition presents a portrait of an artist reckoning with devastating trauma, haunting memories, and an elusive, lifelong quest for freedom. “Nothing to do but to try” are words from Lurie’s own memoir, exemplifying the eternal quests of his life and his art: to survive as the ultimate act of creation, and to create as the ultimate act of survival.